Glacier muscles by Eagles
<p>Glacier senior Kyler Harkins (left) dives for a loose ball Friday night during Western AA boys basketball action with Missoula Big Sky at Glacier High School, </p>
<p>Glacier senior Bryan Michaels shoots over two Missoula Big Sky defenders Friday night during Western AA basketball play at Glacier High School. (Patrick Cote/Daily Inter Lake)</p>
Playing at home for the first time since the opening game of the season, the Glacier boys (4-2 overall, 1-1 Western AA) shook off a poor shooting night to run away from Missoula Big Sky (2-5, 0-3) 51-34 and pick up their first conference win on Friday.
The Wolfpack, who are averaging more than 65 points a game this season, couldn’t get out to its normal pace against the tough Big Sky defense. So instead, Glacier sparked its scoring with defense of its own.
Playing in a zone for the first half of the first quarter, Glacier led just 4-2 five minutes into the game, and changed to a pressing man defense to increase the pace of play.
“That really effected tempo there,” Glacier coach Mark Harkins said.
“We had to go to man, I thought the kids did a good job and got the tempo up a little bit. It wasn’t quite to where I would like but it got better as the game went on.”
The change of pace worked well, frustrating the Eagles, who would score just two field goals in the final nine minutes of the first half.
Glacier, in turn was able to work its way inside the Big Sky defense to pick up a few points at the basket and take an 18-12 lead into halftime.
While steals and quick layups changed the pace of the game, it was the deep ball that changed the outlook. Glacier bookended its scoring in the third quarter with a pair of 3-pointers, one each from senior Bryan Michaels and junior Sam McCamley. Tanner Olsen opened the fourth quarter with a 3 that sparked an 8-0 run and gave the Wolfpack its largest lead of the game at 42-21 with 5:35 to play.
Glacier coasted into the locker room, with freshman Jaxen Hashley cleaning up at the free-throw line, scoring four of his eight points on free throws in the final minute to end any hope of a Big Sky comeback.
“I don’t know what the reason was for our poor shooting, but they loosened up in the second half and started shooting it better,” Harkins said. “That was good, they got rolling.
“Neither team was scoring very well offensively. It was a tough game for both sides tonight.
“You’re going to have those games where you don’t make shots and you’re going to have to rely on your defense. I thought the kids found a way to get it done tonight.”
Michaels led Glacier with a game-high 11 points. Olsen had nine and Epperly and Hashley each scored eight.
Jesson Preston led Big Sky with nine points and Colin Bingham had eight.
“We had a couple of keys that we had to do going in,” Harkins said. “We were concerned about Bingham, their big kid. I thought the kids did a nice job on him. Preston is a great shooter, so we wanted to put someone on him all the time.”
Big Sky was coming off a grueling 45-42 loss to Flathead on Thursday. The Braves hit a 3-pointer with two seconds left to edge the Eagles in Missoula.
“They had a tough game last night,” Harkins said. “Then they turn around and go on the road. I know they were pretty gassed. That helped us too.”
Glacier is at the start of a three-game homestand, hosting Columbia Falls on Thursday and Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, on Jan. 20.
Big Sky 4 8 7 15 — 34
Glacier 12 6 16 17 — 51
BIG SKY — Stanley Underwood 6, Colin Bingham 8, Jesson Preston 9, Michael Banna 4, Alex Mustard 2, Nick Simmons 3, Bennett Chelini 2.
GLACIER — Bryan Michaels 11, Evan Epperly 8, Kyler Harkins 2, Cain Boschee 4, Sma McCamley 6, Tanner Olsen 9, Jaxen Hashley 8, Greg Jones 1.